Republicans were understandably jubilant after winning control of the US Senate on Wednesday, but if the victory is to mean anything come the 2016 general election, then the really hard part starts now. An emphatic repudiation of both President Barack Obama’s style of governing and Washington’s enduring political gridlock leaves Republicans in control of both Houses of Congress and the president deeply isolated in the White House.
The question for Republicans now is what they do with this new-found power? Do they spend the next two years dancing self-indulgently on Obama’s political grave or do they dig the foundations of a credible challenge for the White House? Beating Obama and the Democrats this time around was easy — second-term presidents almost always fare badly in mid-terms and with the economic recovery not delivering to the middle classes and foreign policy in a mess, Republicans were pushing at an open door.
There were plenty of real signs of encouragement for 2016, most notably handsome victories in Iowa and Colorado — both swing states that Obama had won in 2008 and 2012 — but the road to the White House remains tough for Republicans given America’s new demographic realities. Many of the key 2014 Senate battles occurred in states that naturally favoured Republicans, so when the victory celebration hangovers clear, the party should be clear-sighted about the future. In two years’ time, the boot will be on the other foot: The Senate races will overwhelmingly favour Democrats. So will a full turnout electorate, particularly if women, minorities and young people swap their disappointment in Obama for renewed hope in Hillary Clinton.
To have a chance, Republicans must use the next two years to show they are a party of government, not obstruction and ideology, and that their low-tax, low regulation, pro-business agenda really can deliver a new sense of opportunity for America’s beleaguered middle classes. The answers may well lie outside Washington where can-do Republican governors can claim a track record of delivering the goods and performed well in the mid-terms under the leadership of Chris Christie, the oversized New Jersey governor whose own 2016 ambitions were enhanced by the results.
None of this will be easy. Mitch McConnell the new Republican leader of the Senate, will have to contend both with hardliners in his own party and Congressional Democrats who will not want to hand Republicans any obvious victories ahead of 2016. But the joker in the pack is Obama, who badly needs to chalk up some achievements before leaving office and may yet prove more willing to cut deals in the name of legacy-building than many of the more Left-leaning senators in his own party. Already Republicans such as Ted Cruz, the Texas Senator who forced the 2013 government shutdown, and his fellow “no-compromise” conservatives in the House have signalled that they intended to hit Obama with as much base-pleasing partisan legislation as they can. “We will send the president Bill after Bill, until he wearies of it,” exulted Senator Rand Paul, another Tea Party darling and 2016 prospect who called the election “a repudiation of President Obama’s policies”.
The result was also a collective shrug of disappointment from a divided electorate that feels the country is on the wrong track. McConnell and his fellow Republican leaders know this, which is why it was shrewd policy to take the high ground immediately and, despite all the bitterness and rancour of the past six years, invite Obama to work with them to get things done.
“Just because we have a two-party system does not mean we have to be in perpetual conflict,” said McConnell, as if butter would not melt in his mouth. “I think I’ve shown that three or four times in the past. I hope the president gives me a chance to show it again.” It is a game, to be sure, but a game on whose outcome Republican chances of winning the White House in 2016 now depend.
— The Telegraph Group Limited, London, 2014
